


Looking Forward

by greygerbil



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-20 05:47:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13711137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: During a disaster relief effort, Genji and Zenyatta find a child. As they bring her to safety, Genji wonders if a family is something that might be in their future.





	Looking Forward

**Author's Note:**

> For Genyatta Week 2018, Prompt: Parents/Babysitters/Interacting with Kids.

“What is that noise? Is that a child?”

Genji stopped to listen. Even now that rescue work had been going on for hours, there were a lot of noises, as you’d expect after an explosion of a major gas pipe which had collapsed several apartment houses. He heard ambulances wailing in the distance, people shouting at each other, search dogs barking, the debris settling with cracks of stone and groans of metal.

Beneath all of it, however, he finally made out a baby’s cry.

“Where is it coming from?”

“Somewhere here, I think,” Zenyatta said, floating above the rubble to lead the way. A torn sheet of corrugated iron that may before have been the roof of a garage had tumbled onto the broken walls of a shell of a room. The structure was half-collapsed, but two of the walls and the ceiling clinging to them were still standing intact.

“I’ll take a look. Help me with this.”

Genji grabbed on to the corrugated iron and waited for Zenyatta to move in place to do the same. The sheet was stuck and would not be pushed aside, but they could still bend it. The vents on Genji’s shoulders let out steam with a hiss as he pulled as hard as he could. Zenyatta brought out two golden arms glowing with energy to bolster his own efforts. Together, they forced it back far enough that a hole was made through which Genji could slip inside.

Small pinpricks of sunlight broke through the gaps between the remains of the walls and the metal sheet, dimly illuminating the dark space. To his great relief, Genji spotted a crib that stood in the part of the room where the ceiling had not come down – yet. Cracks were already running through the concrete above them and Genji moved forward quickly.

The baby, dressed in a rosé onesie with the word ‘Princess’ stitched across the front, was covered in dust and bits of plaster, but looked otherwise unharmed. Genji picked her up with her blanket and quickly ducked out of the room again.

“Here,” he said, holding the child towards his lover even as he himself checked her again for injuries now that he could see better. They both leaned over her for a moment.

“What a relief!” Zenyatta said. “She looks fine.”

“I wonder where her parents are, or whoever was watching her. Maybe they went to get help?” Genji asked.

“Or they were injured but more visible, so the first responders took them away,” Zenyatta answered.

Genji nodded. Both options were preferable to the alternative, which was that either the baby had been left alone or her caretaker’s mangled corpse was buried somewhere under the rubble. There was nothing they could do about that right now, though. Professionals had to move the debris that had settled because if they just started digging without a goal, they risked shifting heavy pieces that might crush those buried underneath.

The baby was still wheezing and whining and Genji found himself awkwardly holding on to the bundle. He’d never had much to do with children, to be true. As a young man he’d had no interest in them and after he almost died by Hanzo’s hand, he’d had barely been able to see sense in his own life, much less concern himself with someone who needed as much guidance as a child.

“Er… would you like to carry her?” Genji asked, glancing at Zenyatta. “I’m not sure how to make her stop crying.”

“Neither am I,” Zenyatta said, somewhat bemused, but he took her from Genji’s hands anyway. Gently rocking her in his arms, he shifted his legs so he was floating cross-legged, which, with his baggy trousers, allowed him to lay her down in his lap like it was a bed. Lifting the end of the red piece of cloth that hung down the front of his trousers, he cleaned the child’s mouth and face off dust as best he could.

“Should we bring her to the hospital?” Genji asked. “The New England Medical Centre is only a short walk down Washington Street and the rest of the work here is probably better done by the fire service.”

“Yes. Dr. Ziegler requested my attendance there to help with the wounded, anyway. The parents might worry if they return, but I’m sure they’ll think to check the closest medical facility,” Zenyatta answered with a nod.

Genji helped steady Zenyatta’s flight with a hand on his elbow as they descended the craggy hill of rubble. His lover covered the child with one large metal hand to keep her in place. The gentle sway of his flight seemed to soothe her. By the time they had reached solid ground, she had quieted down.

“I think she likes you,” Genji said, smiling briefly behind his mask.

“I do make a good crib,” Zenyatta answered.

Genji chuckled, but he doubted it was just that. Zenyatta had an aura that was calming to most people and it didn’t surprise him a child might respond to it as well.

“Have you ever thought about adopting children?” Genji asked, suddenly interested. Omnics had no natural urge to reproduce, but living in a mostly human society, those things could become part of one’s idea for the future, anyway.

“Sometimes,” Zenyatta said. “I don’t know how well I’d do, though.”

“No?” Genji asked, surprised. Zenyatta’s innocent curiosity, endless patience and kind nature seemed like prime virtues for a father.

“I teach, but my students are adults.” Zenyatta glanced at Genji. “Children are quite fascinating to me. I don’t really understand childhood the way humans do. After all, you have all been children at one point and I never was. A newly constructed omnic is more like an adult with amnesia, lacking their own experiences, but not basic programming.”

“That’s true,” Genji conceded. “Still, I don’t think children are so complicated. Many people who haven’t put as much thought into it as you probably would still managed to raise children that came out alright. It is more about affection and attention.”

“That seems to be a constant in most human relationships,” Zenyatta agreed, sounding thoughtful. “What about you, my love?”

Genji turned his steps towards Washington Street at the corner of Marginal Road, where a house was being propped up by beams and scaffolding, hastily erected around Mei’s now-melting wall, which had kept the structure up until the emergency services could turn their attention to it.

“I suppose what I can say now looking back is that I am happy that at no point in my life did I father a child. Until recently, I wouldn’t have been able to give them anything,” Genji said.

“And now?”

“Well, now you would probably raise the child with me, so that’s something I could provide them with,” Genji said with a chuckle.

Zenyatta shook his head, carefully adjusting the blanket around the little girl.

“I think you would make a good father. You have lived – still live – a very storied life. There is a lot of experience to pass on. You also have a good heart.”

“You are biased,” Genji answered.

“Yes, but I also know you well,” Zenyatta said.

The baby starting whimpering again and Zenyatta lifted her out of his lap and held her against his chest, which Genji knew was warm with working machinery. She gave another silent sob and then fell quiet once more.

“Perhaps when Overwatch is standing on more stable feet at some point… we could think about it again,” Zenyatta said after a long moment of silence.

“You would really raise a child with me? After everything you have seen of me?”

Genji had been joking about Zenyatta’s presence in the life of a child he might take in. After all, Zenyatta was well aware of Genji’s worse sides and while he did not hold them against him, Genji doubted he had forgotten them, either. Some of the notches in his metal chassis were Genji’s doing, marks of sparring matches taken too far. He’d been anything but a model student – or even a decent human being – at the start of their acquaintance.

“ _Especially_ after everything I have seen of you. Many would not have been strong enough to overcome like you did. That perseverance is something I’d wish for a child of mine to learn from.”

Genji saw the hospital down the road now. From the corner of his eyes, he took another look at the child in Zenyatta’s arms, its head lolling against his chest, eyes half-closed. After the last ten years, it was bizarre to think that he might actually arrive at a place where he could think about raising a child – and that there would be someone so perfectly suited for the task of being a parent who thought that Genji, of all people, was just the right person to do it with. One thing still held true, though, as it always had during their relationship: if Zenyatta believed Genji could do something, then Genji started thinking he might be able to do it, too.


End file.
